Category Archives: Law School Life

“Of course I have time!” I claim optimistically. “I have a student’s schedule. As long as I go to class, I am good! Monday? Well, I have something…but Tuesday! No, actually I work then…Now, Wednesday…except not. I have to get some homework done. Thursday is so empty though! Or, it was empty. I filled it last week. Friday is crazy. This weekend! This weekend is soooooo…full. Yeah, I have no time.”

And people wonder why the law student doesn’t blog more regularly.

Just kidding, hi everyone! I am alive. I ended an internship, started a job, and discovered 2nd semester involves twice as much reading as 1st semester. Life has been busy. Thankfully, I am really enjoying it!

My Constitutional, Comparative, and Property law classes all require lots of class participation. I was a little worried at first I would not have enough to say. Then I discovered I disagree with a great many of my classmates, so the real question is finding what not to say! It is a good problem to have.

For most of my life I was – or thought I was – a visual learner. I like to read and I used to process convoluted or theoretical passages fairly easily. When focused on something, I could block out all the noise around me. Because of this, I learned to study like a visual learner. I took copious notes, used different colored pens and highlighters for different subjects, and recorded assignments on note pads and on check lists to make sure I remembered them all.

As I prepared for law school, I implemented all my usual habits. However this time around, they did not work like they used to. I didn’t understand why until I took a Learning Styles test and discovered I am an extremely Auditory Learner. In fact, while Visual Learning came in second, it scored half the effectiveness of when I learned audibly.

How do you recognize an auditory learner? Here are a few descriptors*:

Talks to self, aloud

Enjoys talking

Easily distracted

Has difficulty with written directions

Memorizes sequentially

Whispers to self while reading

Distracted by noise

Outgoing by nature

This list hits too close to home! Who would guess my learning style is the reason I memorize sequentially? It does explain, though, why I’ve struggled so hard over the past few months to study where there is noise. I can’t concentrate even if someone is having a quiet conversation behind me! That is definitely a new problem.

I am not really sure how to study as an auditory learner. The main recommendation I have seen are study groups, but they don’t work well for me. It is too much like a group project. I’ve started looking up what I’m learning on YouTube and that has been helpful. The Academic Enhancement Program at my school also recommends saying information aloud and then recording it on a tape recorder to play back.

The weirdest part of transitioning from a primarily visual to auditory learner is how powerless I feel. The old tricks don’t work. I can’t write something out and then understand the subject. I have to talk it through and listen intently. When I read something convoluted, re-reading it doesn’t work. I need to hear the professor explain it to actually get it. While this leaves me somewhat frustrated, I’m glad I know this about myself now. I think it will make next semester a lot easier.

Then again, I am a verbal processor. Why am I shocked that I am also an auditory learner?

I recently finished Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek. In the book, Sinek demonstrates how work environments impact five different chemicals in the human body: Endorphins, Dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin, and Cortisol. Endorphins mask physical pain with pleasure in times of stress or fear (the “runner’s high”). Dopamine rewards goal oriented behavior with a rush of pleasure when we complete something we set out to do. Serotonin releases feelings of pride and pleasure when we feel like people like or respect us. Oxytocin generates a sense of love, friendship, or deep contentment when we see people we like and trust. Cortisol triggers flight or fight instincts in times of high stress or danger.

Since these chemicals impact the way humans survive and interact with one another, they play an important role in work environments. High stress, competitive environments where employees feel powerless and pressured to produce big or risk losing their jobs produce unhealthy, chemically imbalanced workers. This imbalance applies to CEOs and janitors alike, regardless of perceived job pressure. (In fact, the imbalance likely impacts the janitor more if he feels powerless to change the situation.)

In jobs that emphasize short-term results over long-term relationships, workers depend on their survival chemicals: Endorphins, Dopamine, and Cortisol. This creates an environment where people live in a “flight or fight” mentality and are constantly stressed about meeting high goals and expectations. When Cortisol is released, the body shuts down “unnecessary” systems, including the immune system. This impacts a person’s physical and mental well-being. However, because of Endorphins and Dopamine, it doesn’t feel like a constant barrage. It can feel good and even addicting. These chemicals, however, only mask the damage caused by stress, they don’t fix it.

Further, with work environments that foster uncertainty and anxiety come lowered levels of Serotonin and Oxytocin – meaning people feel less appreciated, content, and socially engaged at work. Where jobs are highly competitive, employees view each other as competitors instead of allies. People feel less comfortable sharing ideas, making mistakes, or collaborating on projects. This impacts not only a company’s ability to thrive, but the individual’s.

A prime example of an unhealthy business environment would be General Electric at the end of the 1980s. At the end of each year, the bottom 10% of GE managers whose divisions contributed least to the company’s share price were fired. If the bottom 10% automatically get fired and you see someone struggling, would you help them out? Probably not. You would be putting your own job at risk.

However, more than isolating employees, such environments also foster unethical behavior. When short-term goals matter above all else, things like honesty, integrity, and compliance fall to the wayside. People focus on survival, and when that behavior gets rewarded, they get a Dopamine hit and continue to behave that way. Spread out over time, this behavior leads to corruption and the eventual downfall of a company.

As an avid reader of business books that emphasize the importance of culture, Sinek’s analysis did not surprise me. It shouldn’t surprise you either. People want fulfilling jobs. Humans weren’t designed for constant, high-level stress. It is easy to recognize bad practices in a business.

Yet this stressful, high-pressure, chemically imbalanced environment reflects the very culture that is expected, even rewarded, in the legal profession.

Want to go “big law”? Think long hours and high stress loads. Want to work in criminal law? Prosecutor or defense attorney, someone’s freedom now depends on you. Want to work at a boutique firm, or even start your own law firm? Gotta make sure you make enough to pay off those heavy student loans. How do you pay those off? You take on more jobs, create a higher stress load, and keep going, going, going. For each client, you must strive for justice. Money is at stake. Freedom is at stake. Your ability, or lack of ability, impacts countless lives.

Is it any wonder the legal profession is rife with alcoholism and ranks third in suicides behind doctors and dentists?

The pressure doesn’t begin once you land your first job: it starts pre-law school. Where you work often depends on where you go to law school. The best jobs go to the best schools. Early on driven, goal-oriented people with a natural affinity for Dopamine stand out and get into the schools. Once in the school, the best employers take only the best students. This is the way of the world. You are now competing against your classmates, and because law school grades on a curve, this isn’t a place where everyone can do well. You either receive one of the scarce As, or you don’t. If there are limited As, are you going to help your classmate get one? Not if it hurts your chances. Goodbye Serotonin and Oxytocin, this is not the place for you.

Law school is 3 years. For 3 years, you can survive anything, right? You can survive finals worth 100% of your grade (STRESSSSS!) You can survive competitive classmates and high interest rates on your loans. You can survive…sure, your Cortisol is firing but your Endorphins and Dopamine tell you it is okay. And maybe it would be okay if it actually ended in 3 years, but that isn’t the way the legal profession works. In the real world, law school is child’s play. But this too will be okay, you’ve learned to cope. Probably through alcohol. Definitely through something addictive. Want to make partner in a firm? Want to save the world? Of course you do. Time to get to work. Hit me with the Dopamine.

What happens in the business world when the wrong things get incentivized? Companies become corrupt and self-destruct. Now imagine what happens when you wrongly incentive a whole profession.

Is it any wonder lawyers get a bad rap? Lawyers are stigmatized as ethic-less and money-hungry. Yet the law is designed as an adversarial system where every case comes with high stakes and in law school we are taught to deal with that pressure through isolation and alcoholism. Culturally, we’ve created a chemically imbalanced environment for the very people we entrust with justice. I am sure there are lawyers and law firms that overcome this. There might even be law schools out there seeking balance. It is still a huge problem, however, and not one that only affects those who “have a personality for the law.” Just take a look at our justice system.

I don’t know what the solution is, or if there even is one. I do know that change needs to happen and it needs to start in our law schools.

Today I am in Oshkosh judging high school moot court! It is amazing watching these talented teenagers communicate. It is also a lot easier to be the judge than the participant – alumni status has its perks!

If I had a word for 2017, it would be unexpected. At this point last year, I thought 2017 would be the year I got my wisdom teeth out, paid off my student loans, and read 200 books. I didn’t imagine much else. Well…I did get my wisdom teeth out. I paid off my student loans. I read 119 books. I also spent a summer in Idaho being a camp person (Whhhhaaattttt!) and then moved to Madison for law school. It all seems kind of crazy and impulsive, and it was.

Yet on paper, it wasn’t. I have wanted to go to law school for 18 years. I planned to go after I paid off my student loans and naturally I applied to law school after paying them off. But…Unexpected. Picking Madison after years of planning to go anywhere but there. Unexpected. Discovering that I actually hate living in the city. Unexpected. The social isolation of law school. Unexpected. Learning I don’t love law school. Unexpected. Realizing I’m okay with that.

This was a bumpy year for me. I’m grateful for it. I am grateful for all the uncertainty and confusion and failure. It sucked and left me drained and anxious but it forced me to grow and rely more on God. It reminds me of Romans 5:3-5. “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”

Hope. What a wonderful word.

Thank you to all the friends and family who kept me sane this past year ❤ I am so grateful for you all.

Goals for next year? Read 118 books and live more gratefully. Hold me to it!

Last Sunday my Catholic roommate took me to mass at her church. The new University Catholic Center on State Street is beautiful and includes lovely, soaring spaces, interesting mosaics, and ornate bookshelves without enough books. (I did spot a few works by C.S. Lewis, though, so it passes muster in the end.)

My other (non-Catholic) roommate also came along. She was a bit slap-happy from lack of sleep. When we walked into the sanctuary, she looked at the large mosaic of Jesus and loudly said, “Jesus wasn’t white!”

I was more puzzled by the peacock designs everywhere. I still haven’t gotten an answer about why those are a thing.

Then the priest began speaking and he sounded just like Thor.

To be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to what he was saying because I was so distracted by that. There was guest priest also present who looked like a movie actor, but I couldn’t remember which one. Maybe Rufus Sewell.

(I’m pausing here in annoyance because that isn’t what he looked like at all but I can’t figure out which actor he does look like. It was someone villainous. And dark haired.)

The service ended with a prayer to St. Michael the Archangel. I wanted to know how an archangel could also be a saint so I asked a priest (not the one who sounded like Thor or the one who looked like a movie actor but a third one.) He gave me a half answer about how the word saint = santos = holy and then told me I should become a nun.

This statement came so abruptly that for a few seconds I wondered if I had stumbled into a charismatic Catholic church and if this was a word from the Lord. Then he suggested my roommates also become nuns. And the girls around us waiting their turn to talk to him. In short, all young women should become nuns. He went on for some time about the benefits of celibacy.

I don’t necessarily disagree, but I’m probably not going to become a nun.

Catholicism does run in my veins, though. One of my ancestors was the child of a Catholic priest and his housekeeper. I told this to my roommate but she didn’t get it. She kept asking how a priest could have a child. I didn’t feel like explaining that one.

Overall, I enjoyed my experience attending a Catholic mass. They gave out dark chocolate at the end. I don’t particularly want to go back, though I enjoyed the theological discussion (and the chocolate.) Also I can also now answer people who ask me why I don’t have a boyfriend with, “I’m supposed to become a nun.”

Professors’ office hours confuse me. I think I used them wrong during my undergraduate. Either that or Bryan College had an exemplary open door policy. Office hours here at the law school baffle me somewhat.

You see, during my senior year of high school I read an article that said graduate students should make sure to stop by and chat with their academic advisers on a regular basis. I figured if that held true for graduate students, it ought to hold doubly true for undergraduate ones. In college, I visited my academic adviser at least once a week. As long as his door was open, I marched in and struck up a conversation. Topics ranged from Starbucks ice cream to Biblical restitution to the state of Virginia politics. I went by myself; I dragged friends with me. It never occurred to me this was unusual. I built relationships with all my professors in a similar way, though perhaps not so specifically. Office hours, to my mind, meant an opportunity to get to know the professor outside of the classroom.

Office hours here at the law school look somewhat different. You go in, ask your very classroom-specific question, and move on. You might fit some small talk in, but dropping by just to drop by is an alien and discouraged idea.

In a sense, I get why. Even my smallest law school class rivals the combined student numbers of the Politics and History department at Bryan College. If all of us wanted to drop by for a chat, the professors would have no time to do anything else. They aren’t my academic adviser. In the big picture, they churn out a lot of future lawyers, and I am just one more. I get it…

Yet it still throws me. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced Bryan College was unusual. The school set a policy that sought to value each student and each interaction with them. Whether they always succeeded is up for debate. However, being in an academic setting away from it, I am doubly grateful for it. Bryan College gave me quite a sense of entitlement!

What does this mean for me here law school? If I want individualized attention, I will just need to put a little bit more effort in. I am sure it will be easier to find specific mentors once I have more direction. Until then, it is up to me to seek out the people who can help me find that direction and sit in those stale office hours until I get it!